Everyone behaves and drives a little differently behind the wheel, but are your driving habits putting you at a higher risk of collision? In 2018, a study by Zendrive analyzed a massive dataset of driving behaviors that revealed new trends about Americans’ most common high and low risk driving personas using smartphone sensors. Each driving persona has a unique characteristic that doesn’t overlap with any other persona, even if they appear to have similar qualities. Here’s everything you need to know about the most dangerous drivers on the road today.
High-risk driving personas
While high-risk-driving personas account for only about 29% of all drivers, they’re twice as likely to get into an accident than drivers who are not high-risk. High-risk driving personas from the study include:
- Phone addicts: The riskiest driving persona from the survey was the phone addict. Phone addicts spend over three times more time on their phones while driving than other motorists. Not surprisingly, this persona also has significantly more rapid acceleration and hard braking events than the average driver. Taking your eyes off the road for even two seconds increases the likelihood of getting into a crash by over 20 times.
- Frustrated lead-footers: The second riskiest persona – frustrated lead-footers – made up 9% of the study’s drivers. On average, this persona has nearly three times more aggressive acceleration and hard braking events per 100-miles than the average motorist.
- Speed demons: Making up 8% of drivers in the study were speed demons. Speed demons speed over 75 mph nearly six times more than the average driver and tend to make longer trips than 55 minutes. This behavior is highly unsafe, even if there are no other cars on the road.
Fortunately, if you identify with any of these high-risk driving personas, it’s still possible to change your habits and lower your risk of collisions on the road. By always following traffic laws and putting down your phone, you can help make the streets safer for everyone.